Gaming's Misogyny Problem

To come right out and say the gaming industry has a misogyny problem seems rather absurd. Most of us know this by now and have known it for a long time. Unfortunately some people genuinely don't see it so here I am repeating it. The gaming industry has a gigantic, easily avoidable, misogyny problem.

This week David Ellis, a designer at 343 Industries, tweeted his disgust for the design of MGS5 character Quiet. As you can imagine the gaming section of the internet erupted. Nothing short of a shitstorm occurred as gamers and gaming media shared their input. Some say Kojima is sexist. Others are saying Ellis is sexist due to Cortana's character design evolution. Many are trying to have a conversation about gender roles in video games but they often get buried under insults and fanboy non-points.

Is Kojima sexist? As much as it pains me to say it, yes. I don't see how he isn't. I've seen many people make excuses for Kojima but there are past issues. I still firmly believe that the Beauty and the Beast Unit in MGS4 is one of the greatest subplots in the series. Within the context of the story they're tragic characters. You can make the case that it's a compelling tale that involves elements of misogyny. Unfortunately Kojima decided to piss on that by adding a photo shoot mode in which the BBU women strike sexy poses. Think about that for a moment. Kojima wants you to be aroused by women who, within the context of the story, were tortured and used. Even if none of that subplot didn't exist he's still using female characters as fapping material.

Is Quiet's character design sexist? Of course. All of her clothing could be folded and fit inside a small cup. It's the exact same situation as fantasy games that put female characters in revealing armor. There's no excuse for that. Unless of course you believe Kojima, who tweeted that critics will feel ashamed when they find out why she is the way she is.

Here's the problem with that: developers create the content. I guarantee that there will be no justification for Quiet being dressed that way, but let's pretend there is. Let's pretend that within the confines of the story there actually is a reason behind the outfit that works with the story. It's still nothing more than an excuse to get a woman in a bikini. The mystery isn't "what are the ramifications of her being that way," the mystery is "why is she in that bikini". It could've been done without making her look that way. Furthermore regardless of how she's dressed I bet her story is horrific, brutal, and possibly rape-y. Which doesn't exactly inspire confidence in her subplot nor the possibility that Kojima somehow isn't misogynistic.

Of course Cortana from Halo isn't immune to this either. There can be a million story justifications that can be implemented into Halo lore, but none have and at the end of the day she was made to look the way she does by developers. It wasn't essential, and the AI Serina proves it. Also the AI vs soldier excuse doesn't really work because both Cortana and Quiet are fictional creations. Again it all comes down to what the developers want.

Having said that there seems to be this completely ignorant belief that if people use hypocrisy against Ellis and/or berate him with "lol pot/kettle" comments then he's somehow wrong. There can and surely should be a conversation about where that message was coming from, but within this topic it's the message that matters. He's a hypocrite but he's not wrong.

What I believe this comes down to is an issue of awareness to the world as it exists at the moment. Kojima has been working on Metal Gear since the 80's (and MGS since the 90's) and the world has changed a lot since then. Unfortunately it doesn't appear Kojima has changed much. He can act as though he has and claim there is some deep meaning behind his misogyny, but I highly doubt that to be true. It sounds a lot like a man who hasn't had to justify 15 years worth of misogyny in his games, finally being confronted with it. It sounds a lot like a man who will someday wish he could have this tweet back.